While major Big Box retailers have struggled to keep pace with consumer-driven demands for instant gratification, Sears Holdings has come up with new innovations to anticipate and serve shoppers with a new one-day ground delivery service supported by a dynamic DC network.

When an industry is changing rapidly, companies must adapt in order to survive. In this whitepaper, a global publisher was seeking a partner that could mitigate risk and build a platform flexible enough for their shifting customer expectations. The solution enabled the company to rewrite their operations game plan and transform their supply chain.

Join our panel of leading economic and transportation analysts as they share their exclusive insight on where rates are headed and the issues that will be driving those rate increases over the next 12 months.

The report pointed out how Chrysler and GM were forced to delay vehicle shipments by up to two days for large quantities of automobiles. While some of the delays had to do with the winter weather, the report explained how when the economy was contracting during the recession, railroad operators put thousands of rail cars into storage and cut staff. And now with shipments increasing, it said that U.S. railroads do not have enough rolling stock for fast deliveries, coupled with problems when dealing with demand surges.

While there was not enough rolling stock to meet the uptick in demand, FTR Associates Senior Consultant Larry Gross told LM that this situation is not so much a question of moving cars out of storage as it is a question of network velocity.

“The cars are out there but they are not moving as fast as they need to be,” Gross explained. “If you have a thousand loads a month and you are getting two loads per car per month, you need 500 cars to service that need. Now let’s say the network is disrupted by weather and gets congested. Train speeds slow down 5 percent so maybe you are getting 1.9 loads per car per month….now you need 526 cars to service the same demand, not 500. The symptom says ‘not enough cars’ when the actual problem is lower velocity.

As of the latter part of March, Gross said non-intermodal merchandise train speeds were running at around 21 mph which is about 6 percent below prior-year levels. And terminal dwell time—time spent in yards waiting for the next train—was up to 23 hours but has now retreated back towards 22 hours, which slightly higher than last year and is a sign of improvement.

In general, said Gross, it looks like railroads are having some trouble recovering from the slowdowns and congestion that resulted from adverse weather earlier in the year, adding it is similar to the problems the airlines have in recovering from cancelled flights, with not enough spare capacity, which, in turn, takes a long time to get all the passengers moved out.

“I think this is a temporary situation sparked by a quick uptick in volume,” said Brooks Bentz, a partner in Accenture’s supply chain practice. “Cars have been steadily released from storage, but the nature of storage means putting cars out of the way so they don’t take up needed real estate and disrupt normal operations. That can mean taking a bit longer getting cars back into service. The railroads are not being overwhelmed by this, but rather I’d see it as a temporary blip that will smooth out relatively quickly.”

According to data from the Association of American Railroads (AAR), the number of rail freight cars in storage as of April 1 was 283,649, which was down 22,667 cars from March 1.

About the Author

Jeff BermanGroup News Editor

Jeff Berman is Group News Editor for Logistics Management, Modern Materials Handling, and Supply Chain Management Review. Jeff works and lives in Cape Elizabeth, Maine, where he covers all aspects of the supply chain, logistics, freight transportation, and materials handling sectors on a daily basis. .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

Subscribe to Logistics Management magazine

Subscribe today. It's FREE!

Get timely insider information that you can use to better manage yourentire logistics operation.

Recent Entries

When an industry is changing rapidly, companies must adapt in order to survive. In this whitepaper, a global publisher was seeking a partner that could mitigate risk and build a platform flexible enough for their shifting customer expectations. The solution enabled the company to rewrite their operations game plan and transform their supply chain.

While it is already reaping myriad benefits from ORION (On-Road Integrated Optimization and Navigation), a proprietary routing platform for its drivers rolled out in late 2013, transportation and logistics bellwether UPS announced big plans for the technology this week.